One year of trying to use only free software, libre hardware, and option source options for all aspects of life.

Tag Archives: Open Source

In hardware, Open Source techniques (collaborative working, sharing experiences and experiments, transparency in production) are designed to democratise the design and production process. To take what traditionally was a difficult and expensive task done only by experts, and provide the tools and methods to make it more accessible, faster, and more efficient.

Not all aspects of my life will provide great opportunity for open source improvement, however – particularly anything that already is fast, cheap, and easy to produce. For example, anyone can produce their own toothpaste in the same time it would take to brush their teeth. Here’s proof:

(this video is my first attempt at using open source editing software- OpenShot. It’s basic, but everything was easy to work out!)

To make toothpaste there’s no special equipment needed, no expensive materials. This recipe is just a variation on the WikiHow one: 80ml baking powder (NaHCO3.), 30ml hydrogen peroxide solution (3%, H2O2), 10ml glycerin (C3H8O3) (or you can use xylitol – C5H12O5), 2 drops peppermint oil. You can get hydrogen peroxide, peppermint oil and glycerin at most pharmacies. There’s not a great deal of variation or strong opinion on different toothpaste flavours, so although I’ll be using this open source version throughout the year, I’m not expecting others to get excited about it.

But what about more complicated matters? What about open source underwear?

I’m somewhat worried – I haven’t threaded a needle since the horrific experience of winning the school prize for sewing when I was 11 – it was a co-ed school, and my gigantic tribal beach baggies had for some reason impressed the judges. But I don’t just want to make undies for the sake of undies – I’m interested in seeing how Open Source methods can change clothing production.

My thinking is based on the simple idea that not everybody is a perfect small, medium, or large. Most people are not shaped like shopping mall mannequins. Even mannequins only fit their clothes because they’re pinned at the back. My chicken ankles make any pants other than stovepipes flap listlessly like spinnakers. My shoulders wouldn’t even look broad in an ’80s power suit, and I think my hips are wider than my chest. While a fit 60-year-old might proudly boast ‘I have the physique of someone half my age‘ it’s not ideal for a 28-year old. I’m not worried about my body shape, it’s just an inconvenience when looking for clothes.

One of Da Vinci’s lesser known drafts, before he really nailed that circle.

But if I were to go to a shopping mall on the hunt for a jacket, I’d have to hope that one of these multi-national chains happened to have a style I like, that suits my body shape, and doesn’t have any stupid piping, or contrast-coloured zips, or whatever else the mass-produced version of this season’s style is.

So finding something I like is already an unlikely proposition, even before thinking about the sizes available. Instead of finding just the right jacket for me, I might end up buying 2 or 3 articles on sale (‘saving’ money) which aren’t necessarily quite the right style, colour or fit.

It also seems that manufacturing clothing in the countries with the lowest wages and then shipping it in bulk to the countries with the highest incomes is hardly an agile system, and difficult to achieve efficiently. We’ve taken this frustration of clothes shopping for granted for a very, very long time. But what other option is there? Tailoring is too expensive, and making things yourself is too difficult, right?

Well, one goal of my project is to get people to consider how an open source method might work in different areas, and I think there are plenty of opportunities in clothing.

For example:

-Imagine an online community, (kind of like a thingiverse version of openwear), where people could share their designs freely with others. These designs would be electronic patterns, readable by a software program.

A user could download a pattern, alter its design to their own taste, and release it back to the community as well.

-If this software program could parametrically alter the designs – for example, if I took my chest, neck, waist and arm measurements as inputs, the program could calculate the necessary changes to the pattern and provide the correctly shaped and sized pieces to be cut out.

-On a private section of your online profile you would have all of your measurements recorded so you could instantly adapt any pattern to fit. (Of course, your measurements might need to be adjusted should you switch to a Paula Deen-inspired diet.)

-Then you would be able to print and cut out the design to sew together. This could be done in a low-tech manner (print out on paper, pin to material, cut out with scissors) or a mid-tech manner (use a computer-controlled plotter to draw the design on material, cut out with scissors) or a high-tech manner (a computer-controlled laser cuts the parts directly)

Now this idea does not solve all the difficulty of actually designing or sewing the clothes, but the focus is on removing or streamlining the computational aspect of a tailor’s work, and leaving more time for creativity in design and high-quality crafting.

In order to illustrate the concept I would like to make my own boxer shorts. I’ve chosen boxer shorts because they’re one of the simpler articles of men’s clothing, and they really only have one key measurement – the waist. There’s generally a bit of give and take in terms of the length and leg circumference of boxer shorts, and I’m sure you could adjust them in a ratio with the waist measurement.

Is anybody keen to help me? I’m not trying to build a huge software program, just develop or adapt:

-a boxer short design (I guess in vector graphic format?)

-an equation which would adjust the size of pieces in accordance with the waist measurement

-a way of linking these together.

Who’s in? There’s a perfectly-fitting pair of boxer shorts in it for you…

Send me an email (sam at yearofopensource.net) or just come along to Open Design City at 7pm on Monday, to discuss the future of undies, to take part in a few activities, play with textiles, work out some techniques/methods we could use, and meet some other interesting folk.

We’ll be discussing, visualizing and quickly prototyping our ideas, focusing on the following core questions:

– democratizing design – how can people without a fashion design background bring their ideas into their garments?
-democratizing manufacture – how can people without a background in sewing put clothing together themselves?
– what possibilities are there for open source development in the field of smart fabrics etc?
– how can current clothing distribution models be improved and updated?
-how could collaboration and community sharing work in a fashion/clothing context?

People of all backgrounds and interests are welcome.

This is a preliminary brainstorming session – in a few weeks we’ll be putting some of our ideas into action at a further workshop.

Now, this project format is hardly ideal – for example, the label is a non-editable PNG, and the .odt with the recipe does not include previous revisions. I’ll be looking into how to better document my projects over the next few weeks. This is also one of the many issues with my current website setup – I’m starting a ‘bug list’ of areas to work on over the year and the project website (and the bug list itself) are right at the top. Vimeo is also a temporary video hosting solution until I get a better website up & running. Anyone have much experience with GNU MediaGoblin, or Kaltura.org?

While some aspects of my project might take a few weeks to organise a solution for (the open source cellphone is hopefully coming soon, but it’s not cheap…) – there are things I can change on day 1. Software is of course the obvious one, so over the course of the day I’m going to be installing Linux and open source software. I’ve already written the suicide note for my personal facebook page, (come join me on diaspora!) and I’m currently composing an inventory of products and services I use.

In other news, the IndieGoGo campaign is still on for another week – tell your friends! Here’s Judith’s latest drawing for the calendar:

Thanks so much to everybody who has donated so far, and I’ve had plenty of offers of help too – the past few days has been wonderful for meeting interesting people doing amazing work in various fields of openness. Also things are ticking along with the crowdfunding, we’re almost at $5K, and I’m currently backing up all important documents and photos etc for the big switch to Linux on the 1st of August. 2 days to go til the project kicks off! Anyone who donates over $25 to the project gets themself a digital download of the calendar, and $60 or more will get you a real paper version to stroke lovingly!

A couple more interviews this week: here’s one with Kay Alexander on EDUKWEST. EDUKWEST is an educational partner of IndieGoGo and they’ve chosen Year of Open Source as a campaign worth supporting, so now you’ll see a little ‘PARTNER’ tag for EDUKWEST on my IndieGoGo page.

Also, if you were in New Zealand and you and the family were gathered around the wireless on Saturday, you may have heard me on This Way Up on Radio NZ. I may be back on later on in the year, talking about, amongst other things, my snuggly successes or blistery failures in creating open source socks.

Every supporter will receive a recipe for their own Copyleft cookies to make and share with friends!

Not everybody’s a multi-millionaire, and now you don’t even need $10 to contribute. If you like the project and feel like contributing, whether you contribute $1, $5, or $1000, every supporter, included those who have already donated, will receive a recipe for Copyleft cookies to make at home. (I can personally attest to their buttery, chocolaty deliciousness). And if you’re feeling greedy, just rotate them to create copyright cookies, and eat them all yourself.

mine. hands off.

Feeling peckish? head over to IndieGoGo, check out how the campaign’s going and give a dollar to a crunchy, sweet, chocolate-studded cause.

One of the key people behind the Firefox web browser, and a board member of the Open Source Applications Foundation, she has been one of the strongest advocates for widespread adoption of open source software. To find out more, check out this interview for Wired!

Jakubowski’s Open Source Ecology is not only attempting to develop the Global Village Construction Set, a set of 50 modular, open source industrial machines vital to modern civilization, they’re also refining and standardizing collaborative techniques and documentation for libre hardware.

They are developing tractors, well-drilling rigs, bread ovens, sawmills, hydraulic motors, and many more (well, exactly 45 more) which can be built using basic, standardized parts and low-cost materials. Their designs are open for collaboration and will be free for download, adaption and reuse. Just sort of saving the world a little bit. You’re welcome.

The 2013 Open Source Calendar (Swimsuit Edition) is a collection of the most important and inspiring people in the worlds of free software, libre hardware, copyleft and open source. It’s a ‘perk’ for the crowdfunding campaign of the project ‘Year of Open Source’ – my attempt to survive an entire year only using, developing and adapting open source solutions to every aspect of life. Interested in the calendar or supporting the Year of Open Source project? or just want to check how we’re doing?

*Richard Stallman and I would both like to make it very clear that he is NOT an open source hero. Richard Stallman is not associated with and does not endorse the project Year of Open Source, due to its use of the phrase Open Source. See “How Open Source misses the point“. He is a FREE SOFTWARE hero (it’s important).

Thanks so much to all those who have contributed so far!

And a special merci beaucoup to Alex from framablog who wrote an article AND translated my press release into french. Thanks to OS Hardware engineer, educator and maker of awesome shit, Jeremy Blum (see him in action here) who posted about Year of Open Source on his website. I even got a call from Loek Essers in Amsterdam, who wrote this article about the project.

We’re doing well but plenty more support is still needed, we’re creeping closer to the IndieGoGo front page with every link, comment, and visitor popping by, so please continue to spread the word on twitter, facebook and blogs!

I’m doing a wee bit of open source construction on the weekend, so if I don’t drill through any major arteries there’ll be a video update early next week. Have a great weekend everyone!